17 years of ruling north korea. he said just one sentence. glory to the heroic soldiers of the people's army. some say he had a squeaky voice and was a bit ashamed of it. i guess we'll never know now. thanks to all of you for being part of my program this week. i will see you next week. stay tuned for "reliable sort." when newt gingrich was denouncing the debate moderators, when rick santorum accused the "new york times" reporter of b.s., well, i thought at least mitt romney hasn't engaged in media bashing. that is until this week. >> i think you're absolutely right. there will be an effort by the "vast left wing conspiracy." >> romney accuses many of the left of doing barack obama's bidding. does he have a legitimate beef? plus -- >> i got sick. once we traveled all the time, and he ate the turkey on the counter. i mean, he had the runs.

>> more on the family's infamous car trip. is campaign coverage going to the dogs? a breakthrough in the pulitzer prizes with the huffington price and politico winning the coveted awards. we'll talk about digital journalism with arianna huffington, and behind the scenes with north korea. abc's bob woodruff on reporting in that secretive country under the eye of government minders. >> wherever you go, they are there with you. you can go 20 yards away, 50 yards away, but not much beyond that. >> and whether the l.a. times should have published those possibly inflammatory pictures of american soldiers posing with mutilated afghan fighters. i'm howard kurtz, and this is reliable sources. zimplt mitt romney has done six cable interviews in the last four weeks. five of them with fox news. now he is the unofficial

republican nominee, he is still keeping the national media at arm's length, still granting little access to the reporters who cover him, and now in an interview with bright bar tv accusing journalists of being in the tank for the other guy. >> those organizations that are attacking you are nonprofit and they're working with the campaign. hopefully we can call on you to -- or have you call on an investigation for them. >> i don't know how much is related to breaking the law and how much is this related to the fact that many in the media are inclined to do the president's bidding and i -- you know, i know that's an uphill battle we fight with the media generally. >> so what should he make of this more adversarial stance, and what about the recent reporting on romney's religion? joining us now in new york, ben smith, editor in chief of buzz feed.com xshgs here in washington jennifer ruben, author of the washington post right turn blog and bill press, host of current tv's full court press and his siriusxm radio show. romney hasn't been a big media

basher. he was saluting the newspaper association of america, responsible, accurate, relevant press. now that he has taken this shot, does he risk further alienating the people in the press? >> you know, i think that old line about not alienating people who buy ink by the barrel is long gone. you see, it's almost part of politics now to attack the press. barack obama did it constantly in 2008. sneered at the cable news psych until particular, and i think for republicans right now to say to the press, i think it's almost part of the party platform that the press is biassed against you. >> jennifer ruben, romney has been doing a lot of intufrz with local television stations. can you run in a general election as opposed to republican primary mainly by dealing with the conservative media? >> to. i don't think so. actually, he hasn't been very friendly to the conservative media either. as you have written and i have written, he has had a hostile ri7. >> you interviewed him once. >> i interviewed hill once. many on the conservative side have interviewed him. it has been a mistake.

i have written him throughout that he should be more accessible. he is a good spokesman for his own cause. >> why is he so wary of the press in general and even the conservative media in particular? >> i think this goes to the overall caution of the campaign, the desire not to make any mistakes, but i think by restricting him, it highlights each and every incident so if he makes a small mistake in one, it really stands out. if he did more of these, it would blend into the background. >> i think you're right. when you do so few, everyone becomes more of a tension-filled event, and bill press, reporters shouldn't treat romney any differently even though they're spending all their employer's money to fly with him around the country, and he barely does any press availability, but inevitably this is an undercurrent 6 resentiment, is it in snpt. >> i am sick and tired of all these politicians, all of them, whining about the media. give me a break. you know, first of all, i also want to say that romney has been treated poorly by the conservative employeed. joe scarborough says he doesn't know one republican that he talks to that thinks romney is going to win. now, that's not like helping his

case. i mean, santorum and gingrich complain about fox. not so long ago they were on fox's payroll, and now mitt romney -- i think the truth is they all have gotten pretty fair treatment. better than they deserve in most cases. >> i would like to second that, and i have made that rant on this program as well that conservatives at least candidates whine about this way too much. they sound like victims. voters aren't interested in this. it's fine for all of us to critique and the media should be held to a standard, but for candidates themselves, i think it comes across as kind of whiney. >> can i point out, it wasn't a reporter who said the trees are just the right size in michigan. i mean, all of those things, they say them. >> he says sh some things that he probably wish he hadn't said. let me turn now to something that's been kind of below the radar. maybe it's now coming above the radar, and that is a focus on mitt romney's religion. i want to play for you a couple of clips, including an interview that he did do this week with a member of the mainstream media's diane sawyer. >> now that mitt romney is the

likely republican nominee, he may need to begin talking about his mormon faith. it would help clear up some lingering questions about mormonism, a religion that still seems odd and ins lar to many. >> people think you're reluctant to talk about being a mormon. >> of course not. i don't think there's anyone particularly in the republican primaries that doesn't know that i am a member of the church of jesus christ of latter day saints. >> you say that new voices are demanding that romney talk more about his religion and particular lis his history of discrimination against blacks. isn't it basically the media that are demanding this? >> well, i think part of a presidential campaign is this kind of broad conversation about everything around the candidate. it's almost like this is where we talk about stuff, race and religion in america, and when people talk about a national conversation, much of it is the presidential campaign. i think this is a huge part of romney's life. he is a major donor to the church. he was a lay leader in the church. it's also, i think, there's all

this nonsense about sinister mormon inch is floating out there. i don't quite nabbed how that's coming from. it's this great american religion that i think people are learning about, and i don't see -- i think the media's role is to explain it. i don't think romney has any moral imperative to do one thing or the other, but it is our job to cover him, write about him sort of in the fullness of who he is. >> yet, jennifer ruben, you describe this piece on buzz feed as an effort to portrait mormons as weirdly out of step and immodern, but as i mention, the author is a member of the lds church. >> i don't subscribe to the notion that people of a certain religion can't make mistakes or show intemporance are aeding their own faith. >> why was this a mistake? >> my concern about this piece was that it made a specific action. ann romney's decision to stay home a function without talking to her, without intufrg her, without contacting the campaign, a result of her mormon faith. then went on to cite chapter and

verse of mormon ideology. making that inference is unfair. what moefsh ates mitt romney is fair game, but to junks that pose her views or his views and mormon theology i think is unfair and really not representative of what these people actually think and actually do in their public lives. >> well, interviews with ann romney are hard to come by, although i think jen did score one. this was -- this came after a week of largely inaction news speculation about ann romney's decision and what it all meant, and this huge missing piece of it had been that this is a church that very specifically values and to this day in its sort of orthodoxed central stream values women staying home and does it in a way that's different than others. it's a choice. it's an equal partnership. it's not a matter of subordination or submission. i think this was something i didn't know, and i was glad to read the story and learn about it. >> you know, i have to say, i think it's true. let's accept that all religions have weird beliefs, okay? i'm a catholic. can i tell you about the virgin

birth, for example? i think we should in the media basically give all faiths a pass and not dwell on his mormonism, unless -- if i can -- i think that's where you are going. unless we nined find out his faith is dictating his belief on what public policy ought to be and if that is the case, with ann romney, we don't know it's the case. >> the first mormon president in the -- there is a focus his religion and a curiosity in the media about his religion that you simply wouldn't see if he was a garden variety krirch. >> i think that's right. >> i'm not saying that all morman -- >> there have been two very expansive pieces. one in the "new york times", one in the washington post his relationship with the church on his -- i think it was helpful at flushing out who he is. i do agree with bill that simply talking about the lit urgy of a religion, juxta possing that with a candidate and i think it's infaur and it does provoke

this sort of i think religious intensity and this religious combativeness that we would be better off without. >> in a sense, i think it's parallel to john f. kennedy, the first catholic who had a serious shot. there's more focus on catholic simple and his relation. orrin hatch has been a good public servant wrsht harry reid has been a good public servant. they're both mormons. there's no reason mitt romney can't be a good president. >> have you gotten much pushback on this particular piece? >> we got some pushback notably. we also if you read the comment section of the piece had mormons saying this is a great piece. i'm going to use it in my sermon on sunday. >> i tease this at the top, but among the many topics chord in the interview that mitt and ann romney did with diane sawyer, was this one. >> we got two questions most often. fist about shameus, which is out there forever. would you do it again? >> certainly not with the

intention -- >> you said it was the most wounding thing in the campaign so far. >> the dog loved it. >> i'm going to go back to ben smith on this one. this was 30 years ago, and i said a few months ago and it's perfectly amuse, but i hope it's not going to take over the campaign, but yet, the media keep -- i'm not going to keep metapho metaphors. why? haven't we had enough of this dog story? >> i mean, to me the basic point as i wrote the other day is if this is the worst thing mitt romney has done in his life, he is in pretty good shape. >> yeah. >> and conservatives -- >> which isn't to say it's not a fun running joke. >> you have been joking about it on twitter. i'll come to you in a second. conservatives now pointing to barack obama's memoir. he ate dog meat at the age of 9 when efg living in indonesia, and that is terrible, and that has been a way of barking at the president. >> i want to make a big confession right now, all right? when carol and i were raising our kids, there were times we left them in the car in the car seats and went in a restaurant and had dinner. we could get arrested for that today. i think what romney did with the

dog was dumb. it was wrong. it was a different time. he ought to just say, boy, we would never do that again today, and ann romney should stop saying that shamus loves it. for conservatives to keep it alive by comparing what a grown man in america did to a 9-year-old did in indonesia in a different culture, i think, is absurd, and they're just keeping it alive. >> the media is spending more time on this than the buffett rule. >> it's insane. >> it is. >> i did a piece to try to lump all these stories, ted nugent and the dogs and eating the dog, the whole thing, and it really is a really terrible disservice to the public. it really -- >> is it hijacking the campaign? >> what is at fault? >> the media for covering these i had on theic storylines, for assuming that the small things tell says great big things about the candidates, which they don't. >> ann has to stop defending it and saying shamus loves it. >> i think we have -- the dog issue, one of the great issues in the country. when we come back, the new york tabloid that published a picture of an alleged prostitute in the secret service scandal and how the rest of the media are handling it. ool. the teacher that comes to mind for me

is my high school math teacher, dr. gilmore. i mean he could teach. he was there for us, even if we needed him in college. you could call him, you had his phone number. he was just focused on making sure we were gonna be successful. he would never give up on any of us.

>> fres has been all over the secret service prostitution scandal. there was the fest interview with one of the call girls that said one of the agents tried for stiff her. the coverage took an unusual defewer when new york's "daily news" published what it said was a picture of this alleged prostitute. you can see it t here. cnn is blurring out the woman's face. bill press, the scandal is about the secret service agents and what they did or did not do. not the prostitutes. would you publish those pictures? >> sure. >> why? >> first of all, this woman says she's not a prostitute. she says she's an escort, which means you can take her out to dinner first. it's more expensive. she's going to sue the secret service, she says, and one of her friends is saying you watch. she's going to be on the cover of "playboy" before this is over. she is -- >> her friend says. you are saying she has made herself part of the story? >> yeah, exactly. >> ben smith, now most tv news shows blurred the pictures,

likedy there, but a couple of exceptions. cbs this morning, fox and fredz friends. they're all over the web. sfli think i agree with bill. she is very much part of the story. yeah, i don't see any problem with running the pictures. >> the contrast to me is what about the agents who are being accused of the misconduct? the washington post apparently is the first to naem a kch the agents, and it showed david chaern's facebook page which had a picture of the xait campaign and him standing behind sarah palin with the notation i was really checking her out, if you know what i mean? that prompted this response from the former alaska governor. >> this agent who was kind of ridiculous there in posting pictures and comments about checking someone out. well, check this out, bodyguard. you're fired. i hope his wife kicks his -- and sends him to the doghouse. >> translate that for me. i don't blame her for fighting back, but using an agent's

facebook page, if he is dumb enough to do this in public, that give you any pause? >> he put himself out there. these guys are in a heap of trouble. they brought disgrace on a part of our government that ranks in very high esteem with the public that is known for its professionalism. these guys screwed up badly, and the pressure to report it. >> that was 2008. that was on his facebook page long before columbia, so where was the oversight on the secret service? somebody should have jump odd that guy and said, hey, wait a minute, this is not who we are. this is not professional. he got away with it. >> bhaets interesting is that the washington post this morning has an interview with a senior secret service supervisor, paul reid, who is said to have taken control of the situation, banished the agents from columbia during president obama's visit there. i think in an effort by the agency to kind of get out ahead of this story and show that it is aggressively investigating. i wonder, it this has gotten a lot of coverage. these people are charged with protecting the president. is the coverage in any way unfairly tarnishing the whole agency for the actions of a

relative handful? >> it's not that relative a handful. this strikes me as the sort of thing for which an agency ought to be tarnished. this was the core team protecting the president in a foreign country doing something that i'm not sure if it endangered the president's life. it was certainly a huge embarrassment and was involved in their on duty, you know, in country actions. i would just add that creepy credit service name to which -- >> anyone disagree with the notion? >> no. >> a lot of people do their jobdz and don't go around -- >> i don't think it's tarnishing the reputation of the secret service. it's the worst thing that's happened to them in a long time. no more than the 11 military, let's not forget, who are being investigated and tarnishing the reputation of the pentagon. these are 122 individuals who acted mentally do you mean and deserve to lose their jobs, as far as i'm concerned. >> you mentioned ted nugent, the aging rock star, if i can still call him that, who made those comments about president obama and we have to charge the voting

booth and chop their heads off. the secret service talked to him. do you think the media played that up a little toomp? >> a little bit. even the white house wouldn't jump on this one. they said, listen, we all have millions of supporters who say stupid things all the time, and i think we should begin to distinguish between people who are actually representatives or who have some standing in the political community and people who are just celebrities saying dumb things. >> of course, he is a celebrity. all right. thanks very much for joining us this morning. up next, arianna huffington on her website winning a pulitzer prize. is the huffington post getting more serious about journalism? ny starts with back pain... and a choice. take advil now and maybe up to four in a day. or choose aleve and two pills for a day free of pain. way to go, coach. ♪

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adriana huffington, was this just a vanity project for her and her hollywood friends? the huffington post has grown into a monster and was bought by aol, and won its first pulitzer prize for a ten-pardon series. joining us now from los angeles, huffington president and editor in chief of the huffington post media group. welcome, and let me start by asking you, you know, it's only one prize, but it's a

prestigious prize brsh do you see this as something of a breakthrough? >> well, it definitely is a breakthrough. it's something that we're grateful for. the newsroom was elated, and it means a lot both for huff post, for all our reporters and editors, but also for on-line journalism. it's a demonstration that great journalism can be practiced on any platform. in fact, what we showed with this ten-part series is you can bring in all the different elements that go into a great story on the web -- video, info graphics, commenting, the participation of our leaders. beyond the stories themselves we had dozens of contributions from families that read and very empowering stories because at the end of its story there was a whole list of things that people could do to help with that. >> i was going to ask you, david wood is somebody who spent most of his career in newspaperses and a ten-part series kind of

feels and sounds more like something a newspaper would do than an on-line digital site. i'm wondering if you think in some ways that huffington post as an example of new media and old media are moving closer together? that might have seemed the case five, six years ago. >> i do actually. we've always said from the beginning back in 2005 that we want to embrace the best of the old and the best of the new. that's what we've done, and that's what we want to continue to do. to be both a very vibrant enterprise with about 500 journ journalists and reporters now, and a growing number of international editions, and to also be a platform with thousands of contributors over 30,000 bloggers, thousands of submissions every week so that basically we are really the place where conversations start. even an ambition one like david would the's on the struggles of

returning vets or the poverty series that we're in the middle of right now where we have 26 reporters all over america covering different aspects of poverty in america, but, again, that's still just the beginning. what really makes a story is all the contributions that come from people who are reading and want to share their own experiences. >> this is an old debate, but as you know, you've gotten criticized from some of the old media types that are being sort of a free rider, that the other newsrooms paid for this reporting, and you get to repackage it on your site. as other sites do as well. what's your latest thought on that? >> well, clearly, a newsroom of 500 journalist is no free ride, and die vulging his resources

would mean that david wood working on the series for eight months, traveling everywhere, talking to dozens of people is no free ride, but beyond that, we actually believe that the kind of journalism at huff is a combination of original reporting, aggregation, and blogging from the community. even if i had an unlimited budget, i would always be aggregating because our promise to our readers is that we are going to bring you the best of the web. we are not producing everything, and that appears on-line. as long as our reader -- >> wal-mart story about the bribery scandal in mexico is

quite a story by "the times." the huffington post is known for celebrity gossip and wardrobe malfunctions in the last few days. we've had pam anderson in a skimpy onesy and educaty perry's dress falling off. did sd this -- i'm sure some of your traffic does come from that. will it help change the image of the huffington post? >> we've said, again, all along that we are a mixture of the high and the low. high brow and low brow. the truth is that most human beings consume news in that way. we want to read the big, in-depth stories on poverty or the struggles of returning vets, and we also want to read the latest things about lindsay lohan or pamela anderson, and if we don't, we don't have to. that's why everything is clearly marked and indicated on the site. the right-hand side, the right-hand column is --

>> and i -- yeah. another great thing is tomorrow, for example, is the french election. increase leg our international editions are act egg like bureaus for us. our french etd tors have a whole plan with our english and american editors and canadian editors about how to cover the french election with translateors at the ready to bring in in realtime what is going to be happening in france tomorrow. that's what is happening in spain, in italy, et cetera. >> clearly the arianna huffington empire is going global, but now since europe site was sold to aol for $315 million about a year ago, i have now read reports recently that you have expanded your aol empire to include communications and marketing and other divisions, and i have also read reports that you are demoted because you are no longer

overseeing tech budget and moviefone, and other tech gadgets. which is it? >> well, what's happening is that as the huffington post has been growing. we're launch aing streaming network internationally at the end of june. we felt it was important to bring in other functions, technology, marketing, and under one umbrella because it makes it easier for us to stay faster. in the course of time we're going to decide what other parts of aol should be more freestanding brands. we haven't made the decisions on all that, but we're in the process of making them. >> all right. i have some breaking news that i would be remiss in not mentioning. you have a piece up today talking about a new app. new application that you are working on. it's called gps for the soul. it measures stress levels in various ways. you write something that really caught my eye, something personal. you said, arianna, that after years of over connectedness, there was a time when i passed out. i broke my cheek bone and got five stitches over my eye.

yet, now that you have this role at aol, as well as the huffington post, i don't have the sense that you have slowed up much. >> no, but i have become much more conscience about sleeping enough. we have a dedicated section on sleep at the huffington post. >> there's another plug. >> unplug and recharging and the gps for the soul, which is an app we're going to be launching in the next two months is really to help all of us realize when we are stressed and find the right steps for us to course correct and get back to that place of relaxation and ultimately wisdom, too. that's the place from which we make our best decisions. >> all right. i have less than a minute, but you and i have talked before about the political tone of the huffington post, and how many commentators are left-leaning. stinsz going to aol, you haven't felt the need to balance it by having more conservative voices? >> oh, we are very open to conservative voices. we are actually serializing

david from's book right now. we have conservatives including conrad black, and we see our coverage as beyond left and right. honestly, the major issues that are in this country at the moment, including afghanistan, including poverty are not left, right issues, and to continue to see them through that obsolete presence really does a disservice to the country. >> all right. congratulations, again, on the prize. thanks for getting up early in l.a. arianna huffington, thanks for joining us. >> thank you so much. >> after the break, abc obtains a picture of a bloody george zimmerman that casts on the early commentary on the trayvon martin case. a very different light. a look at the coverage. that's next. [ man ] may ford. hi, yeah. do you guys have any crossovers that offer better highway fuel economy than the chevy equinox? no, sorry, sir. we don't. oh, well, that's too bad. [ man ] kyle, is that you? [ laughs ] [ man ] still here, kyle. [ male announcer ] visit your local chevy dealer today. right now, very well qualified lessees can get a 2012 equinox ls for around $229 a month.

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when the national media finally got around to reporting on the trayvon martin case, there was a sense of disbelief that a neighborhood watch volunteer could fatally shoot an unarmed teenager, but there was also plenty of anger and outrage and strionics as those who portrayed george zimmerman as a cold-blooded killer. he may be. i don't know. we don't have all the facts. some pundits and television reporters raced to judgment based on a narrative that has gotten more complicated especially with a report from

abc news. >> never before seen publicly pictures seems to support george zimmerman's assertion that he was in a life and death struggle with trayvon martin that might. >> now, we can't show you the picture because cnn hasn't purchased the rights from abc, but you have probably seen it. the shot of his badly bloody head soon after the shooting doesn't prove it was justified, but it does show there was a serious struggle. he was granted a $150,000 bond on friday after a prosecutor questioned whether he was playing to the press with his apology. >> i wanted to say i am sorry for the loss of your son. i did not know how old he was. i thought he was a little bit younger than i am. i did not know if he was armed or not. >> so that's really addressed to the family and for the media happens to be, rekt, mr. zimmerman? >> no, to the mother and the father. >> so while zimmerman remains behind bars for now, the airwaves are filled are arguments about whether he should be released, and thainkts to the cameras this is shaping

up to be the next o.j. trial. i know this may sound old-fashioned and out of step with our popov first ask questions later culture, but this isn't like arguing over politics. it's a criminal trial. not some cable soap opera for our amusement. we just inflame things in this racially charged case by convicting or acquitting the defendant in the court of public opinion. our on camera experts might keep that in mind that they've already gotten out ahead of the facts in this tragedy. in a moment -- lmore. i mean he could teach. he was there for us, even if we needed him in college. you could call him, you had his phone number. he was just focused on making sure we were gonna be successful. he would never give up on any of us. got the mirrors all adjusted? you can see everything ok? just stay off the freeways, all right?

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sfleerchlgts very few western journal is get to see north korea from the inside, but a handful were recently admitted when the communist regime attempted to launch a ronkt. one of them was abc's bob woodruff. >> you know this country is a very isolated place, but every once in a while they really like to put on a show, so they invited us to witness what could be a great triumph, but instead they are desperately trying to change the topic. >> so what are the obstacles of reporting from perhaps the world's most skresive society? i spoke to abc's correspondent earlier from new york. bob woodruff, welcome. >> great to be here with you, howie. >> great to have you. it is relatively rare for north korea to invite western journalists in. i know you have been there before on there trip, and

richard engel also got to go. how closely supervised were you by government minders? >> it's been the same in some ways. this time was a little more relaxed. without question, though, wherever you go, they are there with you. you can go 20 yards away, 50 yards away. not much beyond that. it's very restricted. >> the irony is you went over for this rocket launch, and, yet, reporters in new york found out the rocket had been launched before you guys did. how was that? >> the u.s. is watching this from space, but the rest of us, we were there in this -- really in this journalistic spot where , you know, we got the news from phone calls and emails that came in from us from those of us reporting from the pentagon. we knew that was going to be the case. what we knew we were going to have is the reaction of the people there in pyongyang, in the capital of north korea. we knew we were not going to be the first ones with this information because we didn't have access to the pentagon of what they're seeing from the air.

>> there was a little bit of pushback from the white house on this trip. spokesman telling politico you don't have to be a rocket scientist to know this is a propaganda exercise. reporters have to be careful not to get co-opped. >> if you are talking about going to the site where the launch was going to happen, they wanted -- they said if you bring an expert with you, then we'll let you in. it really doesn't do you much to bring an expert because you can't really see much inside the rocket. you can just see it from the outside. in fact, there was a possibility that in the parade where they brought another kind of missile in the back, whether that's real or not, we don't even know if that's real or if it's just an image for the propaganda. we knew this is propaganda, but the thing about all stories where the government brings you in for propaganda is you can get a lot of things in terms of you -- of what's occurring in a country like that better than anybody else that's never been there before. >> what were you able to get? what did you learn on this trip? were you able to meet any

average people and get a sense of the society under this new young leader? >> i would say more than we did before. we had our minder with us wherever we walked, but they have cell phones there now. we saw people walking around with cell phones, and cell phones that can talk to each other, their friends inside the country, and it's only those that have enough money to buy one of these phones, which is about $250. we were able to talk to them. i also -- there's a new pizza restaurant there where they had music in it and it's actually a joint venture to create this and we were able to sit down and talk to some real north koreans that are working there as waitresses and all that, which is something we never really were allowed to do before. >> that's going to be my headline. pizza now served in north korea. i didn't know that. >> actually, now there's two pizza restaurants there. if you go, then you'll have something to eat. >> after the huge failure of this rocket launch, you were brought to a massive celebration

preceded over by kim jong-you know. what did you take away from the fact that -- was this something you think in a way was partially staged for western media? >> these parades have been exactly that. the last time i was allowed to come in is when they first introduced kim jong-un. he is the one that stood up there on the balcony with his father kim jong il so that all of us had a chance to see, and that was back in 2010. that was right at the same parade, and they let us stand right next to it to show this whole parade. this incredibly impressive, if that's their training is to do goose-stepping, then they're about as good as anybody else who has ever been. that's part of it, and we know that's happening. we're able to see things. for the first time we were able to hear for 20 minutes kim jong-un speak where his father kim jong il almost never spoke. it's only one little sentence back in 1992 was the only tinl we ever heard him on tape on video ever, and now his son did that. we were able to see that and see what people's reactions were to

it, and we didn't really care much about the parade. >> let me ask you as a veteran war krbt about the controversy allowing the los angeles times publishing those photos from afghanistan over the pentagon's objection showing u.s. soldiers posing with body parts of dead afghan suicide bombers. the paper getting a lot of criticism. in fact, let me play you something that we aired on fox news the other day. retired lieutenant colonel ralph peters. >> the real scandal is that "the l.a. times" desperate to survive creates a scandal, publishes the pictures over the pentagon's objections. the real scandal is that the establishment media leaps on another chance to trash our troops. >> the l.a. times create this scandal by publishing these pictures? >> well, would it have been completely invisible and not even known about if they did not report? i don't know. that's a decision that's always made, but i think that's -- so much has been reported. i don't really know what would have happened differently.

>> well, you know, critics say these kinds of photos could insight violence against u.s. troops, and why not report the story and not show the pictures? if it was up to you, would you publish those pictures? >> you know, that's an interesting thing to ask me that right now. i think i would have to think about that for a while. >> okay. the paper's editors -- we invited them on, and they declined. they did delay the publication for several days while talking to the pentagon. they only ran two out of the 18 pictures they had, and here's the interesting point because you have dealt with a lot of soldiers in places like iraq where you were once injured in afghanistan. the pictures were provided by a soldier who was concerned about dysfunction and a breakdown in discipline in the military. at least somebody within the boulz of the military felt that this should get out. this effort to paint the media as anti-u.s. military, you know, i wonder if you would agree with that. i mean, one can agree or disagree with the decision to publish a picture. it doesn't necessarily mean a callous disregard for the safety

of u.s. soldiers, does it? >> when you talk about it that way, you are almost looking back at my lie or something where there was clearly a position that the journalists had about the stories that they want to tell about the war. i think there's been about repo these two wars compared to the past and i think many reasons, as ayou know about that. there's not a draft in the situation, there's a voluntary military, your own children don't have to go, you don't have to go. there is a huge amount of respect for those serving in this. when someone comes and makes the decision to put this in a report, i think it's more a question of journalism as opposed to personal feelings about the military. i think that's much different than it was in the past and i think they feel there's an obligation in terms of journalism to tell stories where there's not this kind of freedom to report it. my personal feelings that those

within the military, most of the friends that i know would not disagree that you need to report what is reported, whether the one who leaked this out had an anti-military condition or was it somebody who was absolutely unique and different from them, somebody that would do what was done in those pictures. so, i don't really know if this is an anti-military position by the "l.a. times." i could assume probably not. i think it's more of a pursuit of truth and coverage in a country like we have. >> long-running debate in military coverage similar to the abu ghraib situation. bob woodruff, thank you for joining us and filling us in on your trip to north korea. personally always happy to see bob woodruff on the air after what happened half a dozen years ago when he was badly wounded and see how far he's come and resume his career.

bill o'reilly goes after one of our guests. a look at why people with the most facebook friends may be, yes, lonely. why "good morning america" is celebrating this week. straight ahead. with the ability to improve roi through seo all by cob. and you...rent from national. because only national lets you choose any car in the aisle... and go. you can even take a full-size or above, and still pay the mid-size price. i'm going b-i-g. [ male announcer ] good choice business pro. good choice. go national. go like a pro.

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time now for the media monitor. here's what i like, the atlanta cover story on facebook and loneliness. people with the most online friends may feel the most isolated. it may be that facebook encourages more contact with people outside of our household at the expense of our family relationships or it may be that people who have unhappy family relationships in the first place seek compan iship through other means. why people use this hugely popular social network. one of the pulitzer prize winners we spoke to the young reporter last november after she had broken a number of stories about the jerry sandusky child abuse algalegations at penn sta. >> it was all local journalism

going to my sources and walking around, knocking on doors and i spent a lot of time knocking on doors and getting shooed off properties and a few times we did get through tpeople and the were able to tell us that these rumors were collect. >> old-fashioned door knocking reported. our program last week caught the attention of the o'reilly factor. we were talking with julia mason of xm about the dual role. >> you saw glenn beck on fox news and bill o'reilly and that damages the fox news brand. >> it can't be too much damage as the fact the highest rated primetime news program in the country. ms. mason is willfully uninformed and dick cheney won't come on the program and i give you scores of other republicans

who don't want any part of "the factor." >> i think she missed the point. o'reilly has spent his career in television news and the reason i didn't argue with her, as bill insists i should have, i was trying to steer her back to talking about people with political agendas that double as tv pundits. she was talking about all partisans. speaking of dual roles in cable news. current tv has now gone a step further by hiring an incumbent. al gore's channel has given a weekly talk show to california's lieutenant governor, gavin newsom. his position will help him line-up guests. >> and engage them in a way that complements my job as lieutenant governor and doesn't take away from that job. >> this is current tv giving free airtime to an elected democratic official. what is next "the obama hour"

"romney and friends." for 16 long years "today" show has won the morning awards every single week until now. shortly after bringing on katie couric for a week it was robin roberts and george stephanopoulos to snap the streak. >> we are so grateful to you, you viewers at home for making us the number one morning show in the country last week. while it's exciting for us this week, of course, we tip our hat to our colleagues over at nbc for their amazing streak that they have. >> now, it's true that matt lauer was off that week, so it goes in the record books with an asterisk but we'll let abc celebrate until the next ratings. join us again next sunday morning 11:00 a.m. eastern for another critical look at the media. "state of the union" with candy crowley begins right now.